Diana Belland

Diana Belland
Professor
Piano, Piano Pedagogy
D.M.A., Ohio State University
B.S., The Julliard School
Office: FA 235
Phone: 859.572.5640
E-mail: bellandd@nku.edu

Dr. Diana Belland is Professor of Piano and Chamber Music at Northern Kentucky University. She teaches in three academic areas at NKU: the Music Department, the Honors Program and the Department of Literature and Languages.

As a Professor of Music, she performs frequently as piano soloist and chamber musician (collaborating with string players) and teaches Applied Piano (piano lessons for music majors), Class Piano, Keyboard Literature, Keyboard Skills, Chamber Music and Accompanying, Piano Pedagogy and MUS 291W: Advanced Writing in the Music Profession. MUS 291, which she created and taught for five years, is included in the Writing Across the Curriculum program, serves as a General Studies course and can be taken by music majors in lieu of ENG 291. MUS 291W will be offered again, Spring Semester, 2008.

As a teacher in the Department of Literature and Languages, she has taught ENG 291: Advanced Composition and ENG 151: Honors Freshman English. During spring semester, 2007, she taught a course for the Honors Program, titled Music and Tyranny. This course will be offered again in fall semester, 2008. Dr. Belland recently completed a sabbatical leave, spring, 2006, during which she worked on a textbook, Writing for the Music Profession: A Resource Handbook for Students and Teachers, designed for use with her MUS 291W class.

Professor Belland received the Bachelor of Science degree from The Juilliard School, where her teachers included Lonny Epstein, Miecyslaw Munz, and Joseph Raieff, and the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The Ohio State University where she studied with Richard Tetley-Kardos. Awarded a Fellowship for two consecutive summers at the Berkshire Music Center (Tanglewood), she studied with Claude Frank and served as rehearsal accompanist for Erich Leinsdorf, former conductor of the Boston Symphony. Dr. Belland completed additional chamber music studies under Artur Balsam and Joseph Fuchs at Kneisel Hall, Blue Hill, Maine and solo studies at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, under Carlos Zecchi.

Among her many concert performances, Dr. Belland has appeared as soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra under William Smith and the Ohio State University orchestra conducted by Marshall Haddock. Dr. Belland is pianist and Artistic Director of the Belland Piano Trio, which performs frequently in the Midwest region, and has been awarded multiple grants, including a Meet the Composer/South Grant, a Fund-for-Innovation Mini-Grant and several Faculty Project Grants from NKU, to present educational outreach concerts with the Trio. Recently, the Belland Piano Trio conducted an Adopt-a-School Program which served four selected high schools in the Greater Cincinnati area. Dr. Belland has also collaborated in numerous chamber music performances with members of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and the Amernet String Quartet, and has appeared with the Azmari String Quartet, Artists in Residence at Northern Kentucky University, in piano quintet performances on campus and at area schools. She makes additional appearances as soloist, duo-pianist and accompanist, and serves as Coordinator of Chamber Music Studies at NKU. Dr. Belland recently performed the Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 3 in c minor with the Pleven Philharmonic Orchestra, Pleven, Bulgaria, February 2, 2007 and repeated her performance of the concerto with the NKU Philharmonic on April 9, 2007 in Greaves Concert Hall.

An active clinician, adjudicator and sponsor for Kentucky Music Teachers Association, Ohio Music Teachers Association and Governors School for the Arts events, Dr. Belland has been a jury member of the Ukraine International Music Festival and maintains a private studio for pre-college pianists. Co-founder of The Norse Festival: Chamber Music at Northern Kentucky University, an annual summer event, Dr. Belland served as its Executive Director from 2000-2005 and currently serves as a member of its Artist faculty. She also teaches and performs at NKU's annual Summer Piano Institute.